Steelers Could Have Competition to Land Free Agent QB Mitch Trubisky

The Pittsburgh Steelers seem to have identified Mitch Trubisky as a potential free agent quarterback candidate, according to recent reports, but they aren’t the only team that could be after the former Chicago Bears starter.

According to Jordan Schultz of The Game Day, the Steelers have been joined by the Washington Commanders and New Orleans Saints as teams showing interest in Trubisky.

Trubisky was taken by the Bears with the No. 2 overall pick in the 2017 NFL Draft out of North Carolina, who traded up to get him, but things did not go well in his tenure in Chicago.

After Trubisky supplanted starter Mike Glennon in his rookie season, the Bears fired head coach John Fox and replaced him with Matt Nagy, and the marriage between quarterback and coach never seemed to be a happy one, despite a Pro Bowl season by Trubisky in 2018.

In 2020, the Bears traded for Nick Foles, declared Trubisky’s job open for competition and decline his fifth-year option. Trubisky won the job but was later benched and left Chicago after the season. Nagy was fired one year later.

Trubisky spent the 2021 season as the backup to Josh Allen with the Buffalo Bills. An athletic quarterback, Trubisky said he learned from Allen’s balance between being a pocket passer and an athlete on the edge, and learned from the same coaching staff that developed Allen into a star.

With the NFL salary cap depressed in the 2021 offseason, Trubisky played under a low-stakes one-year contract in Buffalo that paid him $2.5 million, but could be looking to cash in with more teams having salary cap space and multiple teams interested in his services.

The going rate for a bridge quarterback like Teddy Bridgewater, Ryan Fitzpatrick or Tyrod Taylor has been between $5 and $10 million recently, and with Trubisky possessing the tools that led him to be a top draft pick, teams willing to overlook his failures with an inept Chicago team and hoping that he’s learned the same lessons that turned Allen into a star, Trubisky could be an expensive option for teams looking for a quarterback this March.